NRA Raises $200 Million as Gun Lobby Toasters Burn Logo on Bread
December 29, 2011, 9:10 PM EST
By Peter Robison and John Crewdson
Dec. 29 (Bloomberg) -- A toaster that burns the National Rifle Association’s logo onto bread fetched $650 at an auction last month, just one reflection of the money-making power in the gun group’s brand.
The NRA, which began as a grassroots organization dedicated to teaching marksmanship, enters the 2012 election season as a lobbying, merchandising and marketing machine that brings in more than $200 million a year and intends to help unseat the incumbent president. From 2004 to 2010, the group’s revenue from fundraising -- including gifts from gun makers who benefit from its political activism -- grew twice as fast as its income from members’ dues, according to NRA tax returns.
More than 50 firearms-related companies have given at least $14.8 million to the Fairfax, Virginia-based group, according to the NRA’s own list for a donor program that began in 2005. That same year, NRA lobbyists helped win passage of a federal law that limited liability claims against gun makers. Former NRA President Sandy Froman wrote that it “saved the American gun industry from bankruptcy.”
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That didn’t stop NRA Executive Vice President Wayne LaPierre from citing what he called “a massive Obama conspiracy to deceive voters and hide his true intentions to destroy the Second Amendment in our country” during a September speech to the Conservative Political Action Conference in Orlando. LaPierre said the NRA would work to defeat Obama in 2012.
http://www.businessweek.com/news/2011-12-29/nra-raises-200-million-as-gun-lobby-toasters-burn-logo-on-bread.html
Do you agree or disagree with NRA Executive Vice President Wayne LaPierre's allegation against President Obama? 
= new reply since forum marked as read
...is doing a good enough job of making overkill weapons extremely popular for self-defense. 
It did ban further sales though...
The act created a definition of "assault weapons" and subjected firearms that met that definition to regulation. Nineteen models of firearms were defined by name as being "assault weapons". Various semi-automatic rifles, pistols, and shotguns were classified as "assault weapons" due to having various combinations of features.
The act addressed only semi-automatic firearms, that is, firearms that fire one shot each time the trigger is pulled. Neither the AWB nor its expiration changed the legal status of fully automatic firearms, which fire more than one round with a single trigger-pull; these have been regulated by the National Firearms Act of 1934 and Firearm Owners Protection Act of 1986.
The act separately defined and banned "large capacity ammunition feeding devices", which generally applied to magazines or other ammunition feeding devices with capacities of greater than an arbitrary number of rounds and which up to the time of the act had been considered normal or factory magazines. These ammunition feeding devices were referred to in the media and popular culture as "high capacity magazines or feeding devices". Depending on the locality and type of firearm, the cutoff between a "normal" capacity and "high" capacity magazine was 3, 7, 10, 12, 15, or 20 rounds. The now defunct federal ban set the limit at 10 rounds.
During the period in which the AWB was in effect, it was illegal to manufacture any firearm that met the law's definition of an "assault weapon" or "large capacity ammunition feeding device", except for export or for sale to a government or law enforcement agency. Possession of illegally imported or manufactured firearms was outlawed as well, but the law did not ban the possession or sale of pre-existing "assault weapons" or previously factory standard magazines which had been legally redefined as "large capacity ammunition feeding devices". This provision for "pre-ban" firearms created a higher price point in the market for such items, which lasted until the ban's sunset.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Assault_weapons_ban#Provisions_of_the_ban
If it did nothing its opponents wouldn't be rejoicing at its expiration.
For those specified by name / model number -- easy enough to change the name / model number (DC-9 -> AB-10).
For generic ones based on 'features'? Remove enough 'features'- pin the muzzle brake, pin the collapsible stock, grind off the bayonet lug.
Oh gee, it only has one 'feature' now- so it's not actually a so-called 'assault weapon'.
Even today, in ban-happy california, the practice remains:
None of these are 'assault weapons' per CA law.
The law banned certain feature combinations that many firearms experts[who?] considered to be arbitrary.[citation needed] Manufacturers complied with the law by removing the banned features while leaving the core functionality of the weapons intact. For this, they were criticized as attempting to circumvent the spirit of the law by many gun control groups and even by then-president Bill Clinton.[citation needed] Pro-gun groups responded by pointing out that the manufacturers made and sold exactly what was permitted, and that they could not be held to any standard higher than the law itself.[citation needed]
For example, the AB-10 was a legal version of the TEC-9, with barrel threading and barrel shroud removed; the XM-15 was a legal AR-15 without barrel threading or a bayonet mounting lug; post-ban semi-automatic AK-47s were sold without folding stocks or bayonet lugs, and with standard or "thumbhole" stocks instead of pistol grips. As the production of magazines holding in excess of 10-rounds for civilians had been prohibited, manufacturers sold their post-ban firearms either with newly manufactured magazines with capacities of ten rounds or less, or with pre-ban manufactured high-capacity magazines, to meet changing legal requirements.
The ATF technology branch determined in 1994 that muzzle brakes were not impacted by the AWB, and that muzzle brakes on threaded barrels were not an assault weapon feature, so long as they were welded or soldered in place.
The law prohibited newly manufactured detachable magazines with a capacity of more than ten rounds manufactured after enactment of the law from sale, transfer, or importation. One effect was the increased importation from other countries of large quantities of magazines manufactured before the ban.[citation needed] Former Warsaw Pact countries had large quantities of AK-47 magazines of various capacities that could fit a variety of both pre-ban and post-ban AK-47 variants. Existing stocks of pre-ban American-made magazines were likewise exempt from the ban; this resulted in a brief surge in domestic manufacture of high-capacity magazines before the law took effect. Large capacity magazines manufactured post-ban for military and law enforcement were stamped or etched with the logo "LEO" (for "Law Enforcement Only"
and it was illegal for civilians to possess LEO magazines during the ban....emphasis added
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Assault_weapons_ban#Provisions_of_the_ban
So what exactly did the AWB ban?
Assault rifles vs. "Assault weapons"
The term assault weapon is a United States political and legal term used to describe a variety of semi-automatic firearms that have certain features generally associated with military assault rifles. The 1994 Federal Assault Weapons Ban, which expired on September 13, 2004, codified the definition of an assault weapon. It defined the rifle type of assault weapon as a semiautomatic firearm with the ability to accept a detachable magazine containing more than 10 rounds, and two or more of the following:
Folding or telescoping stock
Primary pistol grip
Forward grip
Threaded barrel (for a muzzle brake or a suppressor, commonly called a silencer)
Barrel shroud...emphasis added
The assault weapons ban did not restrict weapons capable of fully automatic fire, such as assault rifles and machine guns, which have been continuously and heavily regulated since the National Firearms Act of 1934 was passed. Subsequent laws such as the Gun Control Act of 1968 and the Firearm Owners Protection Act of 1986 also affected the importation and civilian ownership of fully automatic firearms, the latter fully prohibiting sales of newly manufactured machine guns to non-law enforcement or SOT (special occupational taxpayer) dealers.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Assault_rifle#Assault_rifles_vs._.22Assault_weapons.22
So while you can correctly argue that the AWB banned the manufacture and sale of firearms that had a certain combination of features, it did not stop the sale of semi-auto black rifles. Most buyers really were not all concerned if their new weapon had a bayonet mount or a threaded barrel designed to accept one. Who needs a grenade launcher anyway? It might be nice to have a folding or telescoping stock and a pistol grip but the main thing was the semi-automatic feature and the versatility of the weapon. The black rifles sold like hot cakes at the country fair and so did semi-auto pistols.
During that time frame every almost every regular shooter at the range I shot at purchased assault weapons. I was amazed to see shooters who had absolutely no interest in owning a rifle that looked like a modern military weapon prior to the ban feel a need to run out and get one during the ban. They all had to get a bunch of hi-cap magazines to go along with their new weapon.
I remember these same people telling me prior to the ban how rifles such as the AR-15 were crappy inaccurate pieces of plastic junk that were worthless compared to their highly accurate bolt action rifles with walnut stocks. I found it fascinating how merely banning something makes it popular and irresistible.
I also found that I was the rare shooter on the line with a old fashioned revolver and I was surrounded by shooters with Glocks and 17 round magazines. I have still not bought a black rifle although I am considering it.
...certainly does not help the cause of "gun owning political center is reassured that there will be no new silly Democratic anti gun initiatives." We need reject the selfish view that any gun control is an attack upon the purpose and meaning of the Second Amendment. Until more people become more responsible for the impact of their rhetoric, such a goal will be impossible in such a polluted political environment, which the NRA and its allies fully promote. Stand up for gun control, doing so is the duty of responsible gun owners.
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Limited knowledge about the three branches of government — executive, legislative and judicial — emerges starkly in Annenberg surveys, which also found that 15% of adults correctly named John Roberts as United States chief justice, but almost twice as many (27%) could identify Randy Jackson as a judge on the television show "American Idol."
http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-civics-20111227,0,3247832.story
And we wonder how people like Roberts, Scalia, Alito, Thomas, and Kennedy get on the Court...
To see those you generally have to go to the editorial page of a newspaper, and we know how few Americans are reading those these days. There are about 45 million daily newspaper readers - there are 80 million gun owners I'm told.
So what gun control are *you* for?
Bill Clinton described much of what goes on in this country in terms of the lack of gun control as "madness." I tend to agree...
Also, when you bandy about rhetoric like "theater created by the dim for the dim" in conjunction with "how can we as responsible gun owners take any of it seriously" you're doing exactly the rhetoric that I am denouncing and essentially playing into Wayne LaPierre's hand. What don't you understand about the NRA's political effect?
The 1994 law includes several loopholes that unscrupulous gun makers and dealers exploited to continue making and selling assault weapons that Congress intended to ban. As a result, many assault weapons remained available.
Some gun companies made inconsequential design changes (like moving a screw or replacing a flash suppressor with a "muzzle brake"
and gave the gun a new name. The new name got the gun off of the prohibited list, and the minor change arguably put it out of reach of the law's "copies or duplicates" language. For example, the banned TEC-9 became the legal AB-10.
Also, some gun companies copied assault weapons that were originally made by other manufacturers. For example, Bushmaster's XM15 was a copy of the banned Colt AR-15, with one minor design change. Functionally equivalent in all relevant respects to its banned cousin, the XM15, like innumerable other AR-15 variants, remained legal. The DC-area sniper allegedly used a new Bushmaster XM15 to shoot 13 victims, killing 10.
Finally, because the 1994 law allowed the continued ownership and sale of "pre-ban" assault weapons, those weapons remained available.
http://www.csgv.org/issues-and-campaigns/assault-weapons/assault-weapons-faq
I answered your question, you'll get no further response.
